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Calf’s Head Hashed, or Ragout

A hash of boiled calf's head, sliced and served in gravy with white wine, forcemeat balls and egg balls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Calf’s Head Hashed, or Ragout

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Wash the calf's head and boil it until tender.

  2. Remove the bones from half of the head and score it superficially.

  3. Beat an egg and brush it over the head.

  4. Sprinkle grated bread, lemon peel, thyme, and parsley on top.

  5. Place in a Dutch oven to brown.

Make the hash

  1. Cut the other half of the head into slices and place in a stew pan with gravy, white wine, forcemeat balls, and egg balls.

  2. Warm together and skim off the fat.

  3. Peel the tongue and serve with the brains as a side dish, or mix with flour, eggs, lemon peel, thyme, parsley, sage, pepper, salt, and nutmeg.

  4. Fry the mixture in small cakes until light brown.

  5. Dish up the hash with the browned half-head in the middle and garnish.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Calf's head
Forms the main body of the hash, providing the meat that is sliced and browned.
Egg
Binds the mixture and gives the browned crust on the head a glossy finish.
Flour
Helps bind the cakes so they hold their shape when fried.
Gravy
Adds moisture and savoury flavour to the sliced meat in the stew pan.
Grated bread
Forms a crisp, browned topping on the head.

The step that matters

Fry the mixture in small cakes until light brown. Frying over moderate heat browns the surface through the Maillard reaction while the interior stays moist. Overheating scorches the outside before the cake sets.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (white wine, egg, bread, lemon, thyme, parsley, pepper):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Winter savoryfits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against white wine, egg, bread, lemon, thyme, parsley, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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